New Delhi: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) Friday raided the premises of a Noida-based couple allegedly selling adult content to Cyprus-based porn sites. The searches were conducted under provisions of the Foreign Exchange Management Act and Section 132 of the Income Tax Act.
The couple, identified as Ujjwal Kishore and Neelu Srivastava, was found to be running a company called Subdigi Ventures, and recruited models on the pretext of social media content creation, an agency spokesperson said.
Incorporated in May 2018, the firm allegedly received Rs 15.6 crore worth of illegal remittances from Cyprus-based firm Technius Limited, which runs adult websites like Xhamster and Stripchat. The couple, agency officials said, used the services of the models recruited by them to sell content for Technius Limited.
Xhamster has been banned by several countries such as Germany, France and the Netherlands for not complying with age verification norms. Stripchat offers “models” to work as freelancers all over the world.
Agency officials further said that the couple received the illegal remittances in their bank accounts in the guise of payment for services such as advertising, market research, and public opinion polling.
“These funds, however, were allegedly proceeds from adult content streamed on Xhamster,” the agency spokesperson quoted said, not wanting to be named.
Further investigation, it is learnt, revealed that the couple had also received around Rs 7 crore in a bank account based in the Netherlands from Technius Limited, which was later withdrawn in India as cash using international debit cards.
The couple allegedly used to pocket approximately 75 percent of funds received from the Cyprus-based firm while the rest of the amount remitted were passed on to the models hired by them.
“During the searches, webcam models who used to work for the couple were found at their residence and their statements have been recorded,” an agency official said.
“During the raid, ED officials discovered a sophisticated studio setup designed for adult content streaming. It was found that the couple used to hire models through social media platforms. Illegal remittances worth over Rs 15.6 crore have been identified to be received in the bank accounts of the company and its directors,” the agency spokesperson said.
(Edited by Gitanjali Das)
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